With our process, my group and I first decided on what our primary research question would be that we all wanted to investigate. We found a lot of interesting ideas with the film Food, Inc. that we watched in class. Then when we had an idea in mind for our primary research question, we came up with our others as well collectively. The we figured out how we wanted to work together to write the paper and divided it up into subtopics between each of us, and I thought that it worked out very nicely. Then we each focused in on our portion writing about two pages each. After that was completed, we then meant up and put everything together reviewing what we all had written and completing the paper as a whole to make sure it all sounded good with what we added. The last thing we did was work on our bibliography and published it to our site.
I think that the product of our collaborative research project came out pretty well, but it's still a work in progress. I think that I learned a lot from doing the research on the topic as well as coming together with my group to hear what they found out. One things I learned from this assignment was how the animals were really being treated, and its something that you never really think of when it comes to buying food. Factory farming is more about getting production faster and cheaper but there are no true concern of health. They put antibiotics to help the animals be free from disease but it still has an effect within our food. Some other things like what the workers go through and the laws they have in place to protect the consumers. Overall, I think that we answered our research question and the group worked very well together.
After reading the article from the center for foodborne illness, I found that there are a lot of long-term health outcomes that many people are unaware of when it comes to their food. As Tanya Roberts says, "foodborne illness must be recongnized as a serious public health issue if we want to make meaninful progress in reducing sickness, injury,, and death associated with foodbourne disease." Within the rest of the article they discuss their reasearch on the health outcomes for five foodbourne pathogens and the various symptoms; I found that to be alarming. Many of the outbreaks are from common food products like ground beef, peppers, peanut butter etc. Since the increase in population and a food supply that is global, in 2008 the government added an oversight to food safety becacause of the risks involved with the publics health. Towards the end, they urge to have more research and focus on the prevention of long term health outcomes. That brings me to our quesiton, are consumer's really being protected from the food industry, and what it comes down to is the consumer;s roll in the matter and what they choose to eat.
Schlosser, Eric. “Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation: Why the Fries Taste Good (Excerpt).” 26 March 2010. Pbs. 28 November 2010
http://www.pbs.org/pov/foodinc/fastfoodnation_01.php
Within the excerpt, Fast Food Nation: Why the Fries Taste Good, Eric Scholosser starts off describing his experience to the J. R. Simplot plan in Idaho and how the potatoes are made in the factory. Then he leads into some background information on John Richard Simplot, one of the richest men who started it all from being main supplier of potatoes in the 1920’s up to frozen French fries starting in the 1950’s. He believed that the frozen food technology would be the food for the future, and looking at it now he was right. As the popularity increased, he then branched out and made a deal to supply the frozen fries to McDonalds. I found it very interesting to all of Simplot's accomplishments at such a young age and the success he achieved throughout his life.
Pollan, Michael. “Our National Eating Disorder.” Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: The Penguin Press, 2006. 1-11.
Pollan, Michael. “The Farm.” Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: The Penguin Press, 2006. 32-56.
Within the reading, The Omnivores Dilemma by Michael Pollan, he writes about how society today has various changes with our eating habits. That we all have so many choices in the different things that we can eat that makes it a dilemma to decided. In result that leads to some of the eating disorders we have today. Many different aspects come into the production of our food, and especially with the labeling as well. Today people are on the go and busy with their lives and do not pay too much attention to what it is they’re eating.
After watching Food, Inc. by Robert Kenner and hearing about how diabetes is now starting to effect children at epidemic alerts, I thought I would like to find out more information about people with this condition to find out what it's like and why it is becoming more prevalent in today’s society. I decided to interview a co-worker, Angela, whose son was diagnosed with type one diabetes at the age of 7. First he just appeared to have the flu, but as time went on the symptoms did not. She also noticed he started to drink large amounts of water as well as go to the bathroom very frequently. At times he would just fall asleep at random times during the day, so she knew something was not right and found out that is what it was. Before our discussion I was unsure of the differences between type one and type 2 and I found that with type one it is usually diagnosed within childhood, and the body does not produce insulin. With the help of insulin therapy and other treatments, the children can learn to manage their condition. Then type two diabetes, which is the most common, is when the body does not produce enough insulin.
Berry, W. (1990). The Pleasures of eating. In What are People for? North Point Press.
When reading the Pleasures of Eating by Wendell Berry, I could not agree more with him because I feel the same way, and think that I would be what he considers to be a “consumer” for the food. He states, “They buy what they want—or what they have been persuaded to want – within the limits of what they can get.” Basically, we do not question anything about the food to how it got to the shelf, and regardless we just purchase what is there for us. He mentions that our society has become passive, uncritical, and depended consumers. People today have been persuaded to want food that has already been prepared for them because they believe it to be more convenient and cheaper. Further on he makes a claim that the industrial eater is a victim because they no longer know eating as an agricultural act, and does not connect between the land and food. Today many Americans are so busy with their lives, that they loose the site of that, and find it easier to just trust what they hear from the advertisements and supermarkets without the time to question. Though as this issue continues to evolve, the food industry is not concerned with the quality or heath but only producing a higher amount at a lower cost. That leaves many negative effects to our society and also changes the way we eat. Then Wendell Berry gives a list of what people can do to eat more responsibly which in the end result people can enjoy their food more.
Kenner, R. (Producer, Director) and Scholsser, E. (Producer). (2008). Food, Inc. [DVD]. Magnolia. Home Entertainment.
After watching the movie Food, Inc. in class, it opened my eyes to some of the things I have never thought of when it comes to my food. Usually I just eat without looking at labels or even wondering where my food was coming from. Though within the film, they wanted to show people the things that have been hidden from us within the production of our food. Basically, the government does not want us to know the truth of what we were actually eating and how inhumanely the animals were being treated. Now the majority of our foods are coming from only a few corporations that leads to dangerous outcomes and is more prone to harmful bacteria that is spread more rapidly because of it. Some of the meat companies like Tyson and Perdue declined to interview. Though one of Perdue previous growers, Carol, was one of the only ones to let them into view the chickens. She explained the different things they do to the chickens that they grow within 49 days now instead of three months, and they are enhanced to have more breasts for white meat. They discussed the different types of drugs they used to help in growing faster, and chemicals they use to help with the contaminations. They produce these chickens from the day they hatch, and they never see sunlight or can barely walk to carry their own weight. Now corn is almost in every product today, and since it is cheap that is what they feed the animals to help with their profits. The food supply of today is geared towards a low cost- higher production rate and is not necessarily concerned with the health of the people.
Schneider, Stephen. (2008) Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of the Slow Food Movement. College English 70.4, 384-401.
The article, Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of The Slow Food Movement by Stephen Schneider discusses the what the movement is all about and the importance of healthy food. The information is primarliy based off of the founder of Slow Food, Carlo Petrini's work. He starts off by discussing a breif history of the movement and how it started back in the 1970's. Basically how slow foods should taste good and muliticultural, sustainable and safe, and fairly treated producers and consumers or in other words, "good, clean, fair". Stephen Schneider mentions that by people being more aware of movements like these will help educate everyone on the quailty of food that is out there and the agriculture
The most rewarding aspect about conducting these interviews was that it was a chance for me to find out more information about my grandmother. We had a close relationship when I was growing up, but over the years have lost touch. It was interesting to hear about many details from her past, and her greatest childhood memory. It brought to my attention the differences in our generation compared to when she was growing up. I felt that sometimes as we were talking, we would get carried away and stray off topic. So trying to get the right information I was looking for was somewhat of a challenge. Though the most difficult aspect I found when conducting my interviews was making sure I was recording all of the data properly. My first interview was in person and handwritten, and that felt unorganized and all over the place with my notes. Since then she has went to Florida, and I wanted to be able to record the interviews. So, then I went to purchase a voice recorder and just had her answer my questions that way. Then uploading that to the site was another story! The end result was to purchase weebly pro… that was the only way I could figure out how to get it onto the site.
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